1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic apparatus for searching a connection target apparatus through a wireless communication line, providing wireless connection to a discovered apparatus to transmit and receive data and a communication control method in such an electronic apparatus and particularly to an electronic apparatus and a communication control method, suitable for communication using a near field wireless communication line such as the Bluetooth.
2. Description of Related Art
Recently, the Bluetooth draws attention as a near field wireless data communication standard. In the Bluetooth, wireless modules compliant therewith have been small-sized and low-priced and the power consumption is low, being easily mounted in portable apparatuses such as a digital still camera and a mobile phone. This makes it possible to wirelessly transmit and receive simply data such as images or voices among these apparatus or information apparatus such as PCs (Personal Computer). For example, there has been proposed to transfer the data of an image captured by a digital still camera directly to a printer without intervention by a PC or a recording medium to print out the image.
If a file transmission or the like is executed after connection between an apparatus and another apparatus using the Bluetooth, a connection source apparatus (Master) must specify a target apparatus (Slave) to be connected. Particularly, it is a general procedure that, upon an initial connection, Bluetooth apparatuses existing therearound are searched, and a target slave apparatus is selected to be connected.
According to such search of a connection target apparatus, because it is not always that the target slave apparatus is found at the first time, in the conventional general method, the number of apparatus to be searched is approximately set five to ten. However, if a plurality of apparatuses are found under such a condition, it is necessary to select the target slave apparatus from them, for example, by the input by the user. This may damage the user's feeling.
On the other hand, a technique has been proposed in which lowering the wireless power from the wireless module during searching than the general condition makes a searchable physical area narrower causes the user to bring the master apparatus close to the slave apparatus, so that the slave apparatus is searched for connection. This technique increases the possibility of connection to the target slave apparatus at an early stage, providing a communication operation intuitive for the user.
Further, if a plurality of slave apparatuses are searched, for example, there is a proposed method, in which, these apparatuses are filtered on the basis of whether or not an application to use can be handled by the slave apparatus, a type of the salve apparatus or the like and a connection is automatically made to a slave apparatus considered to be available or only the slave apparatuses considered to be available are listed and displayed to make the user select one.
Further, when a device address of the searched slave apparatus is registered and in a case of transiting to a connection operation using this device address, the operation load on the user and the cost of the apparatus have been decreased conventionally. As such a wireless transmission apparatus, there is one in which a registration switch is provided. In the wireless transmission apparatus, when it is depressed, an operation searching an apparatus on the slave side is started. If the apparatus is found, a device address on the slave side is obtained, and then, it is judged whether the registration switch is depressed. In a case where it is depressed, it is judged that the registration is accepted, the device address obtained from the apparatus on the slave side is stored in a memory, and the registration operation is terminated. (For example, refer to Patent Document 1).    [Patent Document 1]    Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2003-037603 (paragraph [0027] to [0031], FIG. 2).
Here, to surely connect to a target slave apparatus within a short time period, if there is no different Bluetooth apparatus around the target slave apparatus, the number of the apparatuses to be searched is set to one. However, in fact, a plurality of Bluetooth apparatus may possibly exist adjacently, as in a case, for example, a wireless communication mouse for a PC exists adjacent to a printer. As mentioned above, this is applicable to a case where the wireless transmission power from the wireless is made lower than that at the wireless communication from the wireless module during the searching. Thus, for example, there may be a case where a connection is made to a different slave apparatus searched and the same slave apparatus is searched again though a further search is carried out. Thus, it takes a long time to obtain a correct connection, which may make the user's feeling of operation bad.
Further, in a case where the number of the apparatuses in search is more than one, a plurality of slave apparatuses are searched so that a connection may be made to a different slave apparatus erroneously by the user's selection operation, or only slave apparatuses other than the target one are searched so that the user tries to select one from them, resulting in wasting a lot of time.
Further, if the searched slave apparatus is filtered on the basis of the capability of executing applications or the type of the apparatus, there may be a plurality of slave apparatuses may remain as selection targets after the filtration. Thus, there is no difference in occurrence of a difficult condition for the user in selection. As mentioned above, it is not easy to improve the operation feeling by providing a sure connection to the target slave apparatus as quickly as possible.
The present invention has been developed in consideration of such a problem, and an object of the present invention is to provide an electronic apparatus of which operation feeling to the user upon the connection with a desired slave apparatus by wireless communication is improved.
Further, another object of the present invention is to provide a communication method capable of improving operation feeling of the user upon the connection to the desired slave apparatus by wireless communication.